Back To Life
by LilyGhost
Summary: Stephanie realizes that when life goes from bad to even worse, giving up isn't the only option. An 'everything ends up alright despite what it seems' story.


**I once again ripped-off one of my original stories and '**_**Babe-a-fied**_**' it. All familiar characters belong to Janet. The mistakes are solely mine. **

"_Hellllooo?!_" I yelled at the people rushing by, but no one appears to hear anything I'm saying to them.

I don't know if I'm already dead or just clinging to the brink of death. Either way, I'm as invisible here as I've been in my life. Given all the Burg bullshit I've listened to about what happens to you when you die, and how I need to live 'right' so I can make it up to Heaven, I'd hoped for something better ... _calmer _... whenever I 'crossed over'. But I really shouldn't have expected more than I deserved. I didn't cure cancer. I hadn't saved the world. And I had a hard enough time keeping my rent paid so I sure as hell hadn't figured out how to end poverty worldwide, but I honestly thought just going through life not harming anyone except myself - or occasionally an a-hole who was trying to help me meet my maker sooner - would get me more than just a two-way mirror glimpse connecting me and the land of the still living.

A familiar heaviness sank deep into my chest. I've never been a religious person, but it looks like a small part of me _had _believed in going to 'a better place', and experiencing all the warm, happy feelings that come along with it. I'd been looking forward to the absence of pain, guilt, and that pesky resentment that nips at your heels every second of every friggin' day ... or maybe _I'm _the only one who's been feeling that way.

I actually thought I might be silencing it ... the combined-voice of almost everyone I know telling me that I'm stupid, crazy, and that I'll never amount to anything without them or their help. I'd quickly buried my marriage and spit on its grave, got myself free of Morelli and all the shame and the blame he heaped onto me, and I put Vinnie on notice that I'm going to be broadening my horizons soon. I was finally getting my shit together, and I'd been hoping as a result of that I'd eventually be able to pull myself out of the _'I don't give a fuck_' attitude that had begun to drag me down, making even breathing seem impossible at times.

But I don't feel any different right now than I have been, and I'm not seeing any white lights aside from the hospital's crappy fluorescent lighting. On the bright side, I'm not being prodded towards a flaming inferno while people cheer on my long-overdue demise, so I guess that's _something_.

Though I have to say, even that relief is short-lived since I'm currently watching myself lie immobile on a surgical table. That was weird enough, but even worse is getting up in the faces of the staff without any one of them paying _any _attention to me. Big surprise there. This is a really sick twist on my everyday life. And I really want it to end ... either my life as I've known it or whatever fresh hell this in-between period is.

One of the monitors hooked up to the prone-me suddenly started beeping, which was then followed by _a lot _of activity. I pressed myself into a corner and watched with morbid fascination as people I've never met, a rarity while still being in Trenton, tried to save me. It was sorta funny in a creepy kind of way, since all but a handful of people in my life would tell them to just let me die already ... it's what I've been wanting anyway. As much as I hate to give any of my family and 'friends' credit, they were probably right considering all the stupid risks I've taken since getting fired from my E.E. Martin job.

I've essentially half-assed my entire life, killing time until something killed me. I tried half-heartedly to make relationships, jobs, and friendships work, but I know I've approached everything fully believing that they're only temporary so I shouldn't get attached to them. I wouldn't let myself love anyone who could love me back. It's pathetic, but that was my way of protecting everyone involved, myself most of all. I knew without being told - though I _have _been ... _repeatedly _\- that I destroy everyone and everything I come into contact with.

"Come back to us," I heard the doctor grind out, right before defibrillator paddles made an appearance. "You can do it. I _refuse_ to lose another patient today."

I smiled to myself, walking slowly over to where my body is lying on the table, and then I took a lap around all the people working furiously over it trying to keep a bullet-nicked artery from making me bleed out. Had my family been here, a DNR order would've already been produced and enthusiastically enforced. I shook my head in disappointment. Even my death can't be simple. I glanced over a nurse's shoulder and saw my body jerk as they attempted to shock me and life back into it.

"You might as well give it up," I said to the room that can't or _won't_ hear me. "I'm not really in the mood to becoming another notch on your resuscitation belts. Thanks for the jumpstart though."

The nurse I was almost leaning against ... _shivered_, and I tried hard not to start enjoying this weird here-but-gone existence. There may be a couple of people I'll pay a special 'visit' to before heading North or South.

"Her pressure's dropping fast," Nurse Nobody said, after more machine beeping.

"You've gotta fight," Dr. Do-Right told my body, as he upped the paddle-wattage. "I can't do this alone."

That's funny, considering he's surrounded by a medical team who is assisting him, never mind relying on a machine that my life now depends on. I bet getting zapped would hurt if I could actually feel something. Though lately I've become so numb, I rarely felt anything unless Ranger was near me. Thinking about the Man of Mystery did nothing to up my down mood. _He's _my biggest regret. He's done everything in his power to keep me alive and I returned the favor by getting shot by Rat-face Raybar because I refused to ask Batman for help apprehending the asshole and then wait a measly ten minutes while Ranger dropped everything he was doing to rush to help me out again.

"I don't want to feel this way anymore. Maybe you should let me die so you can start working on someone worth saving," I said out loud to the surgical crew, but again _I'm _the only one who heard me.

My body was subjected to another jerk and I sighed. I'm going to be living/not-living here in the hospital for eternity if they keep this up. I wandered over to the door that kept my fight for life separate from those battling their own demons, and the gunshot wound that landed me here came rushing back to me. I hadn't wanted to stay inside my apartment, just staring at Rex until sunrise like I'd been doing for the last week, so when the ex of my skip called saying Raybar was prowling around her place again, just for something to do, I convinced myself that I had a chance of catching him this time if he didn't suspect he'd been spotted.

I'd had my gun out before I even left my car, but Rat-face's weapon was already pointed - and firing - at me. A push on my Rangeman panic button was all I'd managed before I felt myself falling sideways back into my vehicle. Since I had a vested interest in how this ends, I exited my body but stuck around to see how it played out. Raybar had run off, knowing a gunshot usually attracts trigger-happy cops. This time was no different, and the police were in front of me before I knew it due to Raybar's ex, Clara, having called them after she'd hung up with me. They had already been en route to the scene. I had beat them by only the amount of time it took for a bullet to be shot into me.

Pressure was put on my wound by a cop and paramedics were there and unpacking their gear quicker than I'd seen to date, but even _I_ felt like they were all too late. And now I'm right back where I started ... waiting to see where my life is headed or how it'll end. If the medical professionals thought I was just going to slip back into my body and make their jobs easier, they have a disappointing night ahead of them. They were talking another heart-zap when I lost all interest in what they were doing. I decided to go exploring since I'm not doing much else. It's ironic that I haven't been able to sleep lately, and now I can't seem to 'wake up'.

Part of me knew he'd be riding the ambulance's bumper if he wasn't inside it with me, but seeing Ranger gave me a jolt stronger than the defibrillator's. Family, friends, and loved ones, aren't typically allowed this close to the nearly-departed, but Ranger has _ways. _Even the most psychotic of killers gulp when he demands something from them, so getting as close to me as he physically could at a hospital he would've donated a wing to if it got him what he wanted, shouldn't have surprised me.

I studied Ranger's stress-messed hair. If I had to guess, I'd say he'd recently and repeatedly jammed his fingers through the almost-black strands, which shocked me because he _never_ lets his concern show. What he and I have together, though still undefined, has been the best thing in my life. It hadn't taken me very long after becoming friends with him to see that _he's _the only guy I could let my heart crash and burn for. And that scared the fucking shit out of me. I'm not a romantic woman by any stretch of the imagination, and he'd had me starting to think like one. So I put every brake I could find on us before he could break me.

Yet despite that ... here he is. From what I can see from where I'm currently loitering, Ranger's eyes are scary in what he wouldn't allow them to show. His jaw is clenched so tight with emotions being ruthlessly restrained, I know he'll feel it tomorrow. And the hands that can do things to me no one else can, are fisted on his black cargo-clad thighs. He looks like a man terrified of losing something. It was equally terrifying when it clicked that _I'm _solely responsible for his appearance and what he's feeling right now. His love for me is what has the 'master of control' barely holding on, by me lying where he can't reach me, actively dying before we had allowed ourselves to reach our full relationship potential and establish something really good.

Tank was standing close, talking quietly to him. I can't hear what he's saying, but seeing a worried look on Tank's typically blank face, I knew the activity in my 'room' - and the hopes of those inside it - are winding down. Ranger's eyes closed for a second and then flew back open. The unguarded and unchecked anguish I saw flash briefly in them had me taking an involuntary step away from him. Seeing the same, Tank tried to console him, but Ranger shoved him a good four-feet away, preferring to bear his agony alone.

How much of my life has been spent doing the same? Not letting anyone get close enough to help me. I can't let Ranger suffer like I've forced myself to if I can actually prevent it. He hasn't done anything wrong except love me as much as I'd let him. I may not deserve him, but he for damn sure doesn't deserve what's happening right now.

I didn't have much time. I had to make a decision fast ... stay here and try to create a life with Ranger, or leave the pain and misery behind permanently. Never again having to deal with my insecurities, the Burg, and the uncanny way I find trouble, held major appeal, but I know I can't take the easy way out this time. I can't watch Ranger lose me. Maybe the reason for me being born and surviving against all odds, is _him_. Or it's what I can build with him ... a relationship that saves us both, the family we could start somewhere down the line, possibly even a life I can finally be proud of. I'd felt lost and hopeless only moments ago, yet now because of Ranger ... suddenly _everything _seems possible.

_Damn it! _I really have _no _choice. I won't go out of my way to save myself, but I'll do _anything _for him. If that means climbing onto that surgical bed and back into my struggling-to-live body, quickly getting back on my feet once I learn exactly what my body has to recover from, and telling Ranger once and for all that I _am _his Babe for life, I have to do it. I physically and psychically can't take the devastation I'm seeing on his face because I know it matches mine at the thought of spending eternity without him. Guess I'm finally ready to admit that he literally holds my life and my heart in his hands.

I left him again, but only for a few seconds so I could give the surgical team a reason to celebrate tonight. I stared at my bloody body for a moment before ordering myself to reclaim it. The transition between lingering and living wasn't as beautiful or as peaceful as the movies portray it. I suddenly hurt _everywhere. _The noise alone had me wanting to check out again. _No part _of living has ever been easy for me, but this is a whole other level of pain for me to get myself through. At least now I have a purpose and also a reason to endure it. I thought the reward for a life well-lived was on the other side of a bright light I should've been walking towards, but in reality ... my gift for staying alive is the black-clad man I'm running back to.

"We've got a pulse," the nameless nurse by my head announced to the room.

Yeah ... and who knew I have a heart to go along with it? A heart that's ready to be handed to someone else ... with no strings or price attached to it. Someone had better be giving Ranger and Tank the good news that I was brought back to life or there will be hell to pay as soon as this frickin' tube is removed from my mouth.

Being squeamish when it comes to the sight of blood, being even more disturbed by it when it's my own, I took a little soul-nap until after all my bleeding was stopped and my side was stitched back up. When the anesthesia wore off, I blinked myself awake and rejoined the people who did everything possible to physically save me. As grateful as I am that they gave me time to finally see the light, I really wanted to see the man responsible for making me _want _to be saved.

"Welcome back, Ms. Plum," the doctor said to me, closing my chart after checking my latest stats. "How are you feeling?"

I didn't answer his question. I have more important things on my mind. "I need to see Ranger. _Get _... _me _... _Ranger_."

"What you need is to calm down and conserve your energy and your strength," he replied with a frown at my sudden spike in blood pressure. "We almost lost you."

Tell me something I don't know. "I'll rest after I see him. I promise I'll fight you to the death until I do."

He nodded to a nurse, and in less time than it took me to blink a few more cobwebs from my brain and try to clear my throat so I'd sound less hoarse, I heard his voice.

"I'm here, Babe."

My neck told me the same thing with a welcomed tingle. I felt his big hand curl around mine and then he lifted it up to his mouth to kiss, careful not to dislodge anything I'm connected to. My forehead got not one, but _two _kisses, as if he had to prove to himself that I'm really here in front of him ... and for the most part alright. Given what I'd just put him through, I don't blame him. If our positions were reversed, I'd be gluing myself to him right now so he could never leave me.

"I love you," I whispered because my throat remained scratchy from the intubation tube that had just recently been removed from it. "I don't want to die again without you knowing just how much I _do _love you."

"I know exactly how you feel about me, Steph. It's been my experience that actions show what words can't accurately describe. I've always been the man who loves you, and I'll continue to be the one _in love _with you. Take this as the warning it is, if you die ... I _will _immediately hunt you down in whatever world exists beyond this one."


End file.
